


A Shell of a Man

by marlikestoread



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Angst, Anxiety, Depression, F/F, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Mind Control, Nightmares, PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts, Superpowers, bisexual female character who's a bitch, black outs, future smut, hopefully she'll grow on you, it's not that sad i promise, larry stylinson - Freeform, non graphic rape scenes, superhero au, then there's Belise who is a sassy ass angel, they're some humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-16
Packaged: 2018-04-19 03:31:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4731269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marlikestoread/pseuds/marlikestoread
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry just wants to protect Louis, and along the way he ends up wanting to protect all of London. Louis is trying to get the weight of his shoulders that's been there for the past three years and the only way he can accomplish it is by fighting crime. Liam wants to save everyone, but that's impossible. Niall just thinks being a superhero is 'fucking wicked' and thinks Belise is hot. Belise is a shape shifter with hair that has a mind of it's own and is desperately in love with Niall. Sadie keeps having blackouts and they may or may not have to do with the beautiful girl who came into her Coffee shop and messed with her powers. Oh and Zayn's just trying to keep everything together.</p><p>So basically a story on how seven super powered people eventually became superhero's.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Louis was bleeding. Enough for it to sort of be a problem.

The stab wound wasn't too deep, but it was deep enough to stain a good portion of his suit a deep red, and make him feel more and more like he was going to throw up ever step he took.

He's screwed.

The wound wasn't what scared him the most, really, it was going to be Harry's reaction. It wouldn't be so bad if this type of thing never really happened. But as it is, he's actually quite notorious for coming home severely injured. Last month he came home shot in the shoulder. Last week he was so bruised he couldn't walk home on his own and had to call Harry to pick him up. 

(Harry wasn't too happy with that)

He didn't get why Harry fret over him so much . He had super speed, meaning most of the heals he did get were healed within a day. Plus Liam was a EMT in training he was pretty good at the whole stitching up thing. As long as he had Liam and his super speed he's pretty sure he'll be fine. 

Stab wounds were the worst kind of wounds because they were the hardest for his body to mend. He didn't really know how long it took for a stab wound to heal and he wasn't particular in finding out if that meant bleeding to death first. So that meant he had to wake Liam up, and Liam would go out of his way to make noise and wake Harry up (the two have some sort of secret deal). But he would be fine, as long as Liam stitched him up before the blood loss got to him.

Harry just doesn't get Louis. Louis needs to go out at night. Louis needs to just save someone. Stop a mugging, or a murder, or a young girl getting taken advantage of. It was the only way Louis could feel sure of himself and take some weight off his conscious even if it's just for a little while. Plus, there's know what he'd get a solid eight hours no matter how hard he tried. Sleep was bad for his psyche anyways (or at least that's what he tries to tell himself.)

He pushes the door open slowly and carefully because the front door creaked loudly if someone opened it too fast, and he didn't need to wake up the whole house (Although it was probably a good idea to wake up Liam before he passed out).

Belise was sitting on the couch curled up and watching some weird documentary film on Chimpanzee's. She looks over when he walks in the room and frowns.

"Don't freak out," Louis tries to reason.

He barely see's Belise narrow her eyes and then she's flipping on the light and gasping her usual pale blond hair flashes an indigo color.

"What the hell did you do this time?" she makes no effort to keep her voice down and she sounds angry but the color of her hair says otherwise. Guess he doesn't have to wake up Liam after all.

"Sort of got stabbed?" Louis says trying to sound sheepish at least.

Liam and Zayn's door swings open revealing a disheveled and slightly grumpy looking Liam.

"Hey," Louis tries to sound casual, "Sort of having a problem."

Liam rolls his eyes and sighs in response, "Lemme look at it," he grabs Louis rather harshly by an elbow seating him down on one of the bar stools by the stove counter. 

"What happened?" Liam says his face softening as Louis takes off his shirt and shows him the stab wound which has mostly stopped bleeding. Louis was smart enough to apply pressure.

 

"I got stabbed," Louis says dryly, "There isn't that big of a story. There was a mugging, I stopped it."

"Your not suppose to go out at night anymore…remember?" Liam reminds him softly brushing away the blood he murmurs something to Belise about getting a first aid kit.

"Say's who?" Louis questioned.

"Says Harry," Belise returns into the room with the first aid kit and sits on the counter stool next to Louis. She hands the needle and thread

"Why would Harry have any-"

"Louis!" Harry strides into the kitchen rather dramatically. Louis can't help but roll his eyes. Harry should have become an actor.

Harry's two years younger than Louis but he's massive really. Long limbed. Large Hands.

"I'm fine…I'm fine-" Louis tries to dismiss his best friend with a wave of his hand. In response Harry only grabs that hand and starts examining him for other injury's besides the stab wound. There's a bruise on his shoulder that's already faded into a yellowish color. But other than that he's fine.

"What the hell!" says Harry rolling up one of Zayn's science magazines and raising his hand to whack Louis with it, "I." *whack*, "told." *whack* "you." *whack* "to." *whack* *whack* "stop." *whack* "doing." *whack* "this!" 

"Stop whacking me," Louis pushes Harry's arm away almost finding the reaction comical if Harry didn't look like he was about to cry, "I'm fine Haz calm down."

"You got stabbed!" Harry practically wails (and for Christ sake no one was asleep in this house for sure now) and swings his arm to whack him again.

"I'm going to be fine," Louis grabs his hand and wrestles the magazine out of his fingers placing it down on the counter, "Zayn's not when you see your wrinkled his magazine pages."

Liam snorts below him.

Harry glares and reaches his hand out and then puts it down looking at the ground.

"I'm fine," Louis assures, "Right Liam?"

"Yeah, yeah," Liam frowns standing up using his water manipulation powers to transfer water from a glass too a towel he had in his hand. He gently wipes the blood away revealing a narrow line of stiches only a few inches long on his left side.

"Belise go to bed," Liam orders. (Because if she didn't she'd probably be watching Animals on TV all night long.)

"Crap, missed the end of my program because of you," Belise's hair flashes an angry red and she jabs Louis in the chest with his long manicured fingers, "Keep one eye open tonight Tommo…"

She saunters off murmuring on how we need to invest in a DVR.

Harry and Louis stay in the kitchen in silence avoiding each others glances for a minute longer before Louis looks up at Harry sheepishly, "How about we go to bed Hazza… yeah?"

Harry looks up, and Louis remembers once again that Harry's two years younger. Youngest in the house technically. He looks so innocent and wide eyed. He frowns and eventually murmurs an, "Alright."

Louis gives out a tight smile and puts his arm around Harry's bare waist because Harry was only clad in a pair of black boxers that were tight enough to the imagination. (Which makes Louis want to kick himself because inappropriate thoughts about your best friend are never good). He supposes they were lucky tonight that Harry remembered to put on boxes before sauntering into the kitchen and going all mother hen, he usually slept in the nude.

Him and Harry share a room. The flat only has three bedrooms meaning people had to double up and one of them (Niall) had to grow accustomed to sleeping in the cleaning supplies closet turned smallest bedroom made by man. 

Louis takes pride in the fact that him and Harry's room is the cleanest (even though it's never him that does the cleaning) and that they're room smells the best in the house and less like dirty diapers (not his candles either). 

Louis peels off his tight spandex pants (which make him miserable most of the time because how can one really breathe in spandex) and slides under the covers tired enough to probably get around three hours of sleep tonight. He's about to drift off when he feels his mattress shift and a bony elbow hit his side (his right thankfully) rather harshly.

"Ow," Louis mumbles tiredly.

"Sorry…sorry," Harry says crawling under the covers and curling up into Louis's side putting his head on Louis's chest. He was the bigger of the two but that didn't stop him from constantly wanting to be the bigger spoon.

Not that Louis minded, or it surprised him. Harry was the youngest of them all at eighteen. He needs comfort even if it's for stupid things like worrying about people when they obviously don't need to be worried about. Louis really doesn't mind comforting him, especially if it means he'll get a good cuddle out of it.

"You scare me," Harry mumbles his lips moving against Louis's bare chest right above where his 'It is what it is' tattoo is placed.

"It shouldn't."

"But you do," Harry says.

Louis frowns and puts his hand in Harry's curly mom running his fingers through it and scratching his scalp in a manner that Louis knows will put Harry to sleep in a minute, "Go to sleep Haz."

Harry's breathing eventually even's out and he exhales in small snores.

It takes Louis a little longer to fall asleep than he should.

***  
Zayn sleepily makes his way into the kitchen rubbing his eyes. He plops down in a stool rubbing his eyes with one hand and blindingly trying to find the magazine he left on the counter with his other hand. (Where did he leave his glasses again?) When he finds it he realize it's crumpled and is bent funny, like someone rolled it into a tube.

"Who touched the magazine," Zayn grumbles looking up with what he hopes looked like a threatening look (but according to Liam his threating look was more like a puppy trying to growl).

Harry and Louis lock eyes for a moment and Liam snorts by the fridge.

"Louis came home last night stabbed, Harry attacked him with your magazine…" Sadie briskly walks into the room her face expressionless. For someone who can read minds, she's the most locked away person you can meet. She's nice… Zayn supposes if you get past the sarcastic remarks and rude comments. Even if he wasn't sort of forced to love her, because she was his sister, he probably would have eventually grown fond of her (although it may have taken a few months longer).

"Thank you Sadie," Harry grumbles flipping a pancake he than adds, "In my defense Louis disserved to be hit with something. Be glad I didn't have a baseball bat close."

It was a stupid joke, because Harry would never actually hurt Louis. He wouldn't hurt a fly really. Despite being a practical giant, he was soft and cuddly and all dimply smiles. He couldn’t stay mad at Harry for long.

Zayn continues to glare and he reaches over the counter and pokes Louis in the shoulder effectively zapping him enough to make him stand straight up, but not to actually hurt him. Glad to know his electricity powers still work.

"Owwwww…" Louis complains, "It was Harry who actually ruined it."

"Yeah but you’re the one who came home stabbed, sooo by default I'm blaming you. I don't blame Harry for wanting to attack you…"

Louis slumps his shoulder and scowls and Harry gets a solemn look on his face as he plates another pancake.  
Louis was guessing it was a more of tender topic. 

It was no real surprise to hear about Louis coming home beaten up or stabbed yet again. HE had PTSD, no doubt, and is plagued with nightmares (when he actually sleeps). He has a hard time admitting the PTSD part, and the few times Liam's brought it up, or suggested he get a physiatrist of someone to help him out with it. He eithers is waved off snapped at, or joked with. (none of the responses were exactly reassuring) 

No one knows what exactly happened to him. Except Sadie but she can't exactly control knowing and she's even admitted sometimes accidentally picking up on Louis's nightmares in her own dreams. Harry knows the most after Sadie but even he doesn't know a lot. 

It doesn't take a lot of guesses to get some of the small details. He never mentions parents or siblings and he goes to Harry's on Holidays and the weekends Harry goes.

Liam walks into the room shirtless and his air still damp from the shower, little droplets of water running down his neck and shoulder. Zayn averts his eyes and resists his urge to gape because god damn it that's your best friend and you share a room with him, you've seen him naked hundreds of times. 

"Stab wound?" is the first thing he says grabbing an apple and inspecting it a little bit before taking a bite.

Louis pulls up his shirt revealing a two inch scar that looked at least two months old, "All better…so you know…no need to worry." He takes a hard glance at Harry who is suddenly very interested in the pile of pancakes.

Louis and his super speed (super fast healing) , makes him think he's invincible. It scares Zayn what's going to happen when someone shoots him in the head or he doesn't make it back to the flat fast enough to get stitched up. It scares everyone really.

Louis pulls up his shirt revealing a scar that looked at least two months old, "All better…so no one needs to worry."

"Like hell we don't," Sadie states my eyes move from Liam's six pack to my younger sister who's furiously attacking her pancakes with her fork and a stake knife, "I don't even have to listen to your loud ass thoughts to realize your going out tonight."

"No he isn't," Harry says his eyes blazed with determination, "I'll tie him to the bed if I have to."

"Kinky," Belise who Zayn doesn't remember seeing saunter into the room mumbles. Her hair short bob tucked under the beanie she needed for when she went out in public. She was a shape shifter and she had enough control over her powers to not transform into other people and change her skin tone but her hair had a whole other story. The more emotional she got the variety of different colors her hair turned into. 

Louis turns and glares at the reference (only because he probably wouldn't mind being tied to the bed if Harry was there) and Harry's looking exasperatingly at Louis, "I'm serious," he says, "You can't keep going out and getting hurt."

"I'm fine," he says, "I heal fast."

"Not if your dead," Sadie states exactly what no one wants to say because the meir thought sort of just makes everyone feel squeamish. 

"I've got to go to class," Louis shakes his head scowling as he looks for his backpack. 

"Lou-I made-" Louis is already out the door, "Pancakes…" Harry sighs.

There's a silence in the room until Niall promptly walks into the room scratching at his butt and farting up a storm.  
***  
Sadie didn't really like people if she was to be quite honest. Most of them who appeared nice and pure were really selfish and judgmental. (well she was considerably judgmental too but she at least had a right to be judgmental). It's sickening how much people are so self absorbed and pretend to like each other. Not that Sadie cared what people thought of her, her power would be way to self destructive if she had self confidence issues.

Reading peoples minds was a complete blessing and curse in disguise. Sometimes it could be really useful. Sometimes when she was just tired of hearing people's perverted thoughts, or peoples complains about life in general.

She liked the coffee shop well enough, her boss was okay and let her get away with a lot. Her co workers usually kept to themselves. Usually when people came to the coffee shop they didn't return so they don't get a lot of business (Sadie wonders how it's stayed in business all three years she's worked here) The customers were usually shit, but she could at least she had the power to purposely make there drinks taste bad if they were silently judging her. 

It's around eleven in the afternoon between the breakfast and lunch rush when there's a ten or fifteen minute break of a mad rush of people when the girl came in.

She was insanely pretty.

It wasn't no secret Sadie was Bisexual. She thinks she came out around she was seven to her dad when she questioned why those to girls were kissing. He called them Lesbian and said it was perfectly okay. Sadie then told her father that she thinks she'd be perfectly fine kissing someone with boobs when she grows up. 

She tends not to be split right in the middle. She admits she's gone on far more dates with boys than with girls. Sadie's last relationship was with a boy and it lasted two years (with a very bad and recent ending).

This girl was just…so pretty. She didn't know how to describe it. She had long dark brown hair and milky skin that wasn't tan but wasn't a pasty pale like Sadie's own skin. Her eyes were almond shaped and bright blue. She had a bright smile.

She gets into the range where Sadie would start hearing the buzzing whispers of the girls own thoughts.

Instead though there was suddenly complete silence in her head. She couldn't even hear her coworkers or the other people in the restaurant anymore. It was like the closer the girl got the deafer her thoughts were.

"'Ello?" the girl snaps her fingers in front of Sadie's face and Sadie was so concentrated on trying to hear the voices again she hadn't realized how close the girl was to her now, "Are you alright, darling?"

"Um-erm I- Steve?"

The scrawny red head who has constant perverted thoughts about just about every girl who walks in here nods.

"I…need to go. I'm not feeling well…"

Sadie manages to pad out of the restraint and it takes around five minutes for the buzz of peoples thoughts to return and for her to feel normal again. But she's left dizzy and feeling like someone literally took a chunk of her soul away.  
***  
Niall enjoyed kissing.

He enjoyed Belise's kisses a lot.

He enjoyed hot girls too.

Oh he really really enjoyed hot girls. 

Especially Belise.

And boobs, especially Belise's boobs.

While they weren’t the biggest he's ever seen they were a nice size, and they weren’t fake and plastic like Niomi Evern's were (a girl he dated back when he lived in Ireland). 

They both had the same hour break between there Uni classes, which meant they were both usually home at around the same time. For the first year it was platonic. They became best friends. It seemed everyone had each other and were lost in there own relationships. Harry and Louis. Zayn and Liam. It was the time Sadie was with her asshole if a boyfriend too. But Daisy and Niall were pretty alone so they decided to be friends and then one day Daisy just started to make out with him out of the blue and he didn't really argue. So they became friends who made out.

(Eventually it progressed to friends who gave each other orgasms)

Daisy connected her lips to a place on his neck and he had to stop himself from making an embarrassing noise by biting his lip and he was just about to unbutton her blouse when the front door swung open.

"Disgusting-were you two! On the couch! You could have had the decency to do it in Niall's closet room thing!"

Daisy leaps off from where she was straddling Niall and Niall whips around to face Sadie who was standing in the door way with a disgusted look on her face.

"Crap," Daisy squeaks.

"Don't erm-can you not tell anyone-" Niall tries to start.

Sadie rolls her eyes, "I already knew you dipshit. You two think about it all the time," she than huffs, "I have better things to worry about than petty little hookups." 

Sadie walks from the doorway without another glance behind her and Niall hears the sound of a door slamming from the hallway leading to the bedroom.

"What crawled up her ass," Daisy drawls straightening out her blouse and scooting closer to lean her head on my shoulder. I put my arm around her and she tucks so comfortably around me. It was kind of nice but…

"You erm want to-"

Daisy sits up and slaps me in the shoulder rather hard before repositioning herself so she's laying across the couch and sticking her feet in my lap, "God your such a horny twat sometimes. But you got heating powers so…erm…"

I roll my eyes and grab her ice frozen feet and start to message some of my warmth into it. Daisy closes her eyes and is presumably about to take a nap, her hair turns to a deep embarrassed pink to a light blue in a matter of seconds.

***  
Harry was not a wary wart. Harry was not a wary wart. Harry was not a wary wart. Hary was not-

"Harry your burning the hamburgurs," Liam comments.

Harry looks down at the stove and immediately curses and quickly flips the hamburger to a plate. Fuck, he couldn't even think all day. Louis was stabbed. Louis was hurt again! Last month it was getting shot-last week it was getting beat up to the point where Louis had to call Harry.

It was getting too much.

He didn't even put enough cooking oil on the pan this last hamburger was stuck and he was so close to just screaming at the top of his lungs because he just needed to get this hamburger off the-

"Hey," Liam slides off the stool and comes to Harry's side grabbing the spatula out of his hand with his right hand and putting a careful hand on the small of Harry's back with his other. He does his best to get the hamburger off but it was torn in a few spots and Harry figured they'd probably give it to Loki, the dog they all owned (although it was mostly Liam and Zayn who took care of it), "You alright Haz?"

"'M fine," Harry says softly grabbing his oven mits and pulling the fries out of the oven, "What makes you think I'm not?"

"Well you look like your either about to cry, scream, or murder someone."

"It's a mix of all three," Harry tries to joke.

Harry almost drops the pan of fries with the hand with his oven mit but recovers at the last second setting the fry tray on the counter with a loud bang.

Liam takes a step closer and puts an arm around Harry's shoulder in what Harry guesses is suppose to be a comforting manner but it makes him feel a little bit more miserable, because Louis is right. Harry isn't Louis's mum he shouldn't be making that big of a deal out of this.

"We'll make sure he stays in tonight Harry…tie him to the bed like you said if we have to huh?"

Harry smiles a little bit and nods.

***

"Sadie's home late," Zayn says to Liam as they sit in the living room. Zayn's changing the channel without pushing any buttons (blessing of having a technology related power best friend is not having to search the couch cushions for the remote). Zayn stops on a wrestling channel and Liam just knows Zayn couldn't care less about wrestling but Liam does, and the simple fact makes Liam's heart flutter so much he almost forgets what Zayn says.

"She's home," Belise say her hand moving fast against her paper and her text book propped on her knees. Liam didn't even notice her in the corner doing her homework he was so lost in the world of Zayn Malik.

"When she get home?" Zayn asks.

"During me and Niall's break, was acting like a moody shit," Daisy grumbles.

"Niall and I's," Liam mumbles.

Belise looks up and glares in response.

"Really?" Zayn asks in concern.

"Locked our room," Belise says her tone indicating that she was on her last straw, "Wont let me in."

Zayn goes to stand up-

"She's probably upset because Steve was thinking perverted thoughts about her again and she can't do anything but listen to them, you know enough of that can rile her up," Liam says because selfishly he wants to be Zayn's center of attention, not that Sadie really is an attention seeker. Liam may actually be doing her a favor, she hates it when Zayn gets up in her business or threatens to beat up perverted coworkers. She's an independent girl, has been since she got into this house and Zayn was suppose to be 'taking care of her'. 

"Your right," Zayn says curling into his side and resting his head on Liam's chest looking sleepy and adorable, "She'll probably be fine by morning."

Liam wraps his arms around Zayn's slender body and smiles because he loves to just be close to Zayn like this.  
***  
"Let me in…." Belise bangs her head against her roommates door. This was getting ridiculous it was almost eleven. 

"No," Sadie's voice is emotionless. Sometimes Belise wonders if she even has another emotion besides angry and sarcastic.

"Are you alright?" she says, "Are you having a crisis or something?"

"You can say that…"she grumbles

"Well are you okay? Do you need cuddles?"

"Touch me and I'll bite you," Sadie all but growls. Okay anyone in this house but Sadie would have said yes in a heartbeat to cuddles. They were all touchy feely. But Sadie claimed she didn't like to be touched, it only made people's thoughts louder and gave her a headache.

"I would take that offer if you'd just let me in," Belise groans. She just wants to go to sleep, she has school tomorrow and a English Quiz that has loads to do with the Finals. Sadie was her best friend, they've shared a room for three years now. Don't get Belise wrong, Sadie could be an amazing person (when she felt like it), but she could also be the most frustrating person alive when she wanted to be.

"Sleep with your new boyfriend," Sadie comments.

"He's not my-we're just…" Belise tries to explain but it's practically useless. Sadie was a mind reader, she knew everyone's secrets and feeling weather she wanted to or not. Sadie's powers were like Belise's hair, they had a lot to with her emotions (a reason why Belise suspects she only pretends to be emotionless). She often heard things without wanting too. And Belise has had feelings about Niall for awhile now, no doubt Sadie's picked up on it one way or another.

"Fuck buddies who are both crazily insane about each other?" Sadie says with no remorse at all for her bluntness.

"You can be a real bitch," Belise was just done.

Sadie chuckles humorlessly from the other side.

"Is this about Victor?" Belise asks.

Maybe if she tries to talk about it with Sadie, she'll open the door use Belise as a shoulder to cry on, and let Belise go to sleep in her bed and not on the couch.

"No, not everything is about him alright?"

Okay, so maybe offering to be the shoulder to cry on wasn't the best plan. Daisy hasn't even seen Sadie cry much. Only around the anniversary of her father's death, when she broke up Victor after he slapped her across the face, and that one time she got ridiculously drunk and it made her powers go wonky.

"I understand it was a rough breakup-"

Something's thrown at the door, "Fuck off Bel. Or fuck Niall, I don't care."

"Fine," Belise huff, "Be the same bitter alone bitch you've always been."

It was cruel and mean, but she was being just as rude. I was sort of tired of her being like this all the time. It was either walk on egg shells and get yelled at or go around the egg shells and still get yelled at.

Belise stand up storming down the hall to Niall's bedroom closet thing. It was literally a small twin sized mattress with about two feet of walking room, and his clothing and little belonging either hanging on the racks or laying on the shelves. 

He sits up sleepily as Belise crawls to the ground and under the covers under him kicking her shoes off curling into his side.

"Sadie's a bitch," Belise comments.

"Just had an off day," Niall mumbles, "You know her, heart of gold- acts like she's the devils spawn."

It doesn't make Belise feel much better.


	2. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Louis tries to escape Harry. Zayn awkwardly reflects on the past. Sadie starts to think she's going insane. Belise and Niall are both in love (but idiots). Harry meets someone from Louis's past. Liam deals with his first death on the job.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cara Delevingne would play Sadie and Molly Quinn would play Belise (except imagine her with like shorter whiter hair lol) in case your wondering. I knew you probably weren't. Oh and I listened to Hunger by Of Monsters of Men and I See Fire a lot while writing this chapter and I think the songs sort of fit...
> 
> Lol I'll shut up now.

Louis tries to worm his way out of Harry's grip only to be brought closer to his bare chest. Louis face was almost smothered placed firmly against Harry's butterfly tattoo.

"Still not asleep," Harry mumbles, "Not gonna go to sleep until you do."

"Good luck with that," Louis says trying to sound challenging (but he was starting to get tired it was very very comfortable cuddling in bed with Harry).

"You'll get tired eventually," Harry says determinedly, "I know your already more tired than me, you have to be, you haven't had a proper night sleep in months."

Harry was right, if Louis closed his eyes right now it'd take a minutes tops to fall asleep.

"Harold-"

"Please Louis," Harry's voice comes out a little whiney, "try, please."

Louis sighs and shifts closer to Harry, because when Harry is set on something he's pretty damn set on it. It's one of Louis's favorite things about him. Harry was reasonable and kind to everyone, Louis doesn't think he's even heard Harry raise his voice or talk bad about anyone. But above anything he was stubborn. It was no use fighting Harry now. 

It's just gotten to the point where he dislikes sleep.

Okay sure he doesn't like the feeling of being tired either, but it's come to being reminded constantly about his past or actually doing something to change someone else's future. IT makes him feel better as a human. As if the past's he made as a teenager were almost actually the past.

He slips into sleep without even realizing it really, and he has no idea how long he's actually asleep when he's woken up again screaming with a cold sweat.

For a few moments he forgets where he is and he still think's he's in the dream, he's awake but not fully, and the more aware he get's the more he can hear his own ragged breathing and Harry's constant mantra of , "Your okay, your not there, your okay," and he can start to feel Harry's hand rubbing small soothing circles in between his shoulder blades.

He listens to Harry's voice for a few moments and concentrates on the soothing feeling of Harry's large hand until his breathing evens out considerably. Then he's pulling away from Harry and moving to crawl out of bed and stand up.

"Louis?" Harry says his voice still an octave deeper from sleep and Louis tries to not let it effect him, "Where are you going?"

"Out," Louis says shortly taking another deep breaths and looking on the flooding of clothes on his floor for his suit.

"It's in the laundry," Harry says (and Louis sort of finds it creepy that Harry knows exactly what he's looking for), "Haven't put it in the dryer yet so if you fancy putting on a wet suit-"

"You don't know how to work the laundry Harold," Louis finds himself chuckling as he opens his closet and goes on his tip toes finding the suit right by their weed stash. Louis takes pride in the fact that he knows how Harry thinks, and while Harry could be perceptive and deep at times, he had the worst hiding places.

"Louis…" Harry tries.

Louis was done with Harry trying to stop him, Harry just needs to learn that he's not always going to get his way, especially with Louis.

"You can't stop me Harry-you see I tried? Okay? You just don't understand why I go out-"

Harry suddenly stands up his own frame towering over Louis's petite one. Harry stares Louis in the eye for a few moment before grasping Louis's hands tightly in his own. Louis half expects Harry to wrestle him back to bed with the intent look he's getting. But Harry only squeezes tight enough for Louis's full concentration to be on Harry and Harry alone, "Than make me understand, tell me why you go out every night…"

"I…what?" Louis wasn't expecting Harry to say that.

"Make me understand Louis?" Harry repeats.

Okay Louis, give him a good answer, give him an answer that will make him stop questioning you and why you just need to do that.

"I just-someone killed my family? Yeah? You remember that?" Louis stutters out. 

"Of course," Harry says his whole face softening.

"I can't let anyone go through anything like that…" Louis takes a deep breath and waits till the oxygen reaches his brain before he speaks again ,"I didn't have my powers back then. But I do now and I can do something and you can't stop me Harry. I don't care whatever reasoning you have that I should-"

"Okay," Harry cuts off Louis.

"Wait-what?"

What has gotten into Harry tonight? 

"You can go," the grip Harry's hands doesn't loosen making Louis think that Harry can't actually be serious. Because Harry just doesn't loose an argument like this so easily. Harry was a fighter.

"Really?"

"As long as you take me with you," Harry states.

Oh so there's the catch.

"No way," Louis says his heart starts beating much faster and he actually grips Harry's fingers back in response, "You'll get hurt."

Harry scoffs in response, "It's not like I'm useless? Yeah?"

An old aluminum can floats up in the air than crushes into itself moldoing into a small ball. Louis would be surprised if he wasn't well aware of Harry's metal manipulation powers. 

They all had powers just none of them chose to use them often, they didn't have need to they were in full control of. (Except Sadie he recently found out that she can quiet other peoples thoughts but only to a low buzz, there always there one way or another).

 

"I'm well aware of your powers Harold," Louis scoffs, "But having powers and knowing how to use them to defend yourself or to defend another person is totally different."

"You'll be right there beside me," Harry says softly. Louis realizes how close they are still gripping each others hands like a lifeline. He can feel Harry's breath lightly over the skin of his own face. 

"I…" Louis is torn. He couldn't bare the thought of Harry getting hurt. But Harry wasn't useless either. And it's not like there not in London. There's metal pipes and trashcans everywhere. And getting stabbed and shot were practically impossible, "Fine put on a hoodie or something yeah?"

Harry nods like an eager puppy. Louis unlinks there hands and turns to the closet standing on his tippy toes to grab the extra mask and handing it to Harry with a light smile, "Lesson 1 of Superhero 101 is identities."

"I don't just watch Love Actually Lewis," Harry jokes taking the mask and placing it on before turning around it find his hoodie. He ends up finding one of Louis's but Louis likes how Harry looks in it, so he doesn't say anything as Harry zips it up, "I've seen Batman before."

"Yeah…yeah," Louis smirks and can't fight back the chuckle as Harry trips over his own legs and almost face plants on the ground.

Harry grins and flips up his hood casting a shadow over his face down to the tip of his nose. The only think Louis could clearly see now was his smirk in the moonlight, "How do I look?"

"Like you need pants."

Harry looks down at his pale legs and blushes a deep red.

"Right."

 

"It's beautiful," Harry says once he's fully seated on the ledge, "Like I've been in the city at night a few times but usually in big groups piss ass drunk. Never got to appreciate the beauty. I've always been like running home with grocery's or something. "

Louis hums in agreement his fingers tapping over the cement of the ledge letting his feet hang down. 

"So we just sit here?"

"Yeah," Louis nods, "Wait till someone screams or a car alarm goes off, it'll happen eventually."

Harry's silent for a few moments but then he says, "I..I may not act like it, but I think it's brave and good what your doing. I just get worried when you come back hurt."

Louis shrugs.

"You may not care about my opinion but I'm proud…"

"I care about your opinion Harry," Louis is hasty in his reply and he sounds almost offended Harry doesn't think so, "Your my best mate."

Harry was so much more than a best mate, he'd almost call Harry his brother, except for the fact that he most defiantly loves Harry in a not so brotherly way. He'd like to say that he was in love with Harry but admitting to that just scared the living shit out of him. Love scared the living shit out of him in general. The last group of people he loved ended up dead.

"If you cared about my opinion so much… why didn't you just stop doing what you do. I get you feel like you need to do something but this isn't your job or your-"

Harry halts what he was about to say next and flinches back when he get's sight of Louis's narrow eyes. Louis opens his mouth like he's about to say something in reply when there a sudden scream.

The two of them rush down the fire escape latter following the sounds of the scream down the street until they come to a rather dark alley where most of the streetlights around were broken, dull, or flickering. There were two guys one was going to cover her mouth and the other was making grabby hands at her pants.

Harry surprisingly was first to react using the metal of the garbage can top to hit one of the ski masked men in the back of his promptly knocking him out. Louis zooms forward and grabs the other man by the neck and throws her into the wall, "Get the fuck away from her," Louis growls.

The men cower back from Harry and Louis who were standing in front of the girl like some sort of wall.   
Louis could still hear the girls pained whimpers behind him. Out of the corner of Louis's eyes he can see the hard look on Harry's face and it was almost scary in a way and Louis has never felt scared of Harry in his entire life.

"Scat!" Louis says making sure to put as much edge and authority to his voice as possible, "Your lucky I'm nice and don't just cut off your balls or just fucking kill you right here."

The two men cower away and Louis carefully turns around seeing Harry with his mask off and his hood down holding the sobbing girl. He would have scolded him for taking off the necessary material if he didn’t get the good look at the girl.

She was younger than Sadie and Belise…she would be around Lottie's age when she… Louis shakes his head and instead listen's to Harry hush the girl.

The girl finally stops crying and wipes her tears and goes to hug Louis too. Louis stiffens in surprise because honestly he usually never stays behind to long to do the whole hugging thing. But he'd sort of feel horrible not walking the girl home now that he thinks of it. She looked so much like Lottie but nothing like her really. It jus unnerved Louis it always unnerved Louis when it was young girls in type of situations like that.

"Thank you," she said, "Thank you so much."

Louis nods and stays silent and Harry assures that it's no problem, "How about we walk you home darling? Yeah?"

She nods and Harry hooks arms with her as the girl leads him down the street. Louis trails behind carefully listening as Harry asked questions about her home, her family, Uni. She was seventeen the age Lottie was when she died. And in the light she defidantly had a few similarities to Lottie. Light blond hair. Blue eyes pale skin. Louis felt his heart beat in his chest and shakes his head from memories of the past as they climb up the steps to her families home.

"You'll be fine now, yeah?" Harry says.

"Yeah, thanks to you…I never got your two's names?"

"Erm," Louis decides to reply because taking off a mask was already a stretch, "It doesn't matter. We're just hero's that's all."

"I bet," she says, "But can I please ask you one thing? Your powers where did they come from? I'd think they'd be loads fun…"

"Their difficult," Harry chuckles, "We don't know honestly."

"Well…" she says, "It's a good thing you two were given them and not any random person."

And with that she closes the door.

Harry stands at the door of the girls house for a minute or so, Louis doesn't push him to leave, he just decides to give him his time. So he's sort of surprised when she turns around and start's walking fast towards the building they were sitting at earlier.

"Harry?"

Louis hears a sniff in response and Harry stops walking, "Oh Harry," Louis speeds up to catch up to him and puts an arm around his waist, "Don't cry, love. She's alright now."

"Yeah," he looks up and gives Louis a watery smile, "And we did that. Imagine what would have happened if we didn't…she was only seventeen."

Louis hums in agreement putting his hands on Harry's face and wiping away the tears with the pads of his thumbs.

"I get it now," Harry states, "But you can't go out alone."

Louis sighs because he thought he finally got through to Harry, thought he finally made Harry understand that this is far beyond Louis himself. "That's not your choice I'll go out-"

"No no," Harry chuckles, "let me finish."

He stops walking and turns around grabbing Louis's hands, "I want to do this with you. I want to make a difference too…I can't stand the thought of another girl who's walking only a block or two away from the flat getting violated like that when I…we can do something about it. The girl was right…I think we were given these powers for a reason."

Louis can't help but smile and he almost jumps forward and kisses Harry but he stops himself from doing something stupid and instead just steps forward and hugs him tight.

"You get it?"

"Yeah," Harry tucks his head into Louis's neck and smiles, "I get it."

They go home after that because it's almost four in the morning and they do need some sort of sleep before school and work tomorrow. When getting to the door of there flat they're surprised when it swings open.

Sadie stands there dressed in her Café apron her blond hair thrown up messily and her eyes tired and unfocused.

"Wow," Louis remarks, "Your up early."

"Fuck off," she mumbles not making eye contact and taking another step forward. 

Harry grabs her shoulder and turns her around carefully, "You alright?"

"'M fine just called to work early and pissed," she turns around and hurries down the stairs.

Harry gives him a calculated look, "I'm sure she's fine Harry," Louis says yawning himself, "She's not a morning person."

"Yeah, yeah…but she just seemed more off than usual," Harry said narrowing his brows in concern. Louis actually found it adorable how much he cared for Sadie. He didn't even have to care for her. She was Zayn's sister not his, but he still got worried.

Then Louis gets this horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach because the more he thought of it the more he realized he loved Sadie like a sister too (no matter how difficult she was) and she loved Niall and Liam-and them all. He'd made a new family out of this life.

And as much as he'd like to say that was all dandy because of how alone he felt for the first few months after they died, but it wasn't dandy. 

What if he got this family killed too?

***

Sadie left before anyone woke up in morning, meaning Zayn didn't get to talk to her. When Zayn asked Belise about it last night she tells him Sadie wouldn't even let her into the room and start's grumbling under her breath, so Zayn stops asking her questions and leaves her to sort of sulk in the corner until Niall comes in and pokes her cheek and she bursts out in a grin like the sun just exploded out of Niall's ass. (When the hell did that become a thing). It also makes him wonder where exactly she did sleep last night because it didn't look like the couch was even slept on.

He don't know how he went from seeing Sadie as an annoying burden as being an overprotective idiot over her, he doesn't exactly know exactly when things changed and he started to actually love his sister and not despise her. But he remembers first meeting her for the first time since Zayn was like two.

They looked nothing alike really. They were only half siblings technically and she was the cause of there family almost falling apart. (Zayn was only a baby when his mum cheated on his dad and he didn't even know that it happened until he was eighteen).

Sadie was fully white with dirty blond hair thick eyebrows and blue eyes. She scowled all the time (Zayn learns that's he default expression) and hardly talked. She was pratically monotone and emotionless, seemingly bored with everything. Laughter and smiles wasn't something Zayn saw often of her (although she didn't appear really sad either). 

But his mum said that he had to take care of her now because her dad died and she was special like him. It was around the time he'd met everyone else through Simon Cowell a man who's literal power is being able to track down kids like Zayn and Sadie. Simon figured they did better in groups and suggested the six of them either moved in or moved close to each other to help figure out there powers. Zayn hadn't met anyone else with powers so he figured it wouldn't be a bad idea exactly and on a a wim listened. Harry, Louis, Liam, Niall, Daisy, ,and himself moved together in a flat by a university in London as flat mates trying to figure out there powers. Simon promised to visit every year and sends them a paycheck every month occasionally with a letter attached. He'd only been with his new friends for a month before Sadie popped into his life due to a phone call.

His mum told him about his affair and that Sadie's biological father died in a car crash yesterday.

He was angry at his mum, like really angry. Because how could she? He thought her parents were happy! They had Zayn and Donyia before the affair and the other two daughters after him, only a happy couple could do that…right? His mum was just so frustrating, and she was telling him that Sadie had to live with him because she was different too…she had weird powers too and she was young and scared and his mum didn't know what to do (like Zayn knew much better really). And she sent the seventeen year old girl to live with him the next day.

The rest didn't mind 'the more the merrier' and she was quiet too, so they really didn't mind. She shared a room with Daisy.

He didn't talk to her much, he didn't want too. She could have wrecked their family. He only occasionally checked up on her only because it was hard to really stay mad at his mum, and him mum asked for weekly updates. It was easier to stay mad at Sadie, because he didn't know her, and he didn't exactly care about her either.

Their family didn't have enough money to send Sadie to school too, and Sadie didn't appear to mind. She only got a job down the street at a hipster café within a day of moving in (Zayn still doesn't get how she landed that one).

She was quiet until she wasn't.

She came out of her shell and showed her brooding sassy attitude that would be considered blunt, the others still didn't mind her which was weird, because she was such a bitch.

Zayn only started to really pay attention to her when he caught her making out with a girl on the couch. 

Sadie awkwardly told the girl she'd see her tomorrow and the girl left and Zayn just stood their watching Sadie dumbstruck and Sadie stared back with a monotone expression until she says, "What?"

"Your Lesbian?"

"Bisexual," she corrects with somewhat of an annoyed tone (Sadie had three tones really bored annoyed and even more annoyed), "I've brought boys home Zayn, on several occasions actually."

"I-I know," Zayn manages, "You just never told me."

"I'm not stuffed in the closet," Sadie raises an eyebrow, "You never asked Zayn, everyone knows."

"They do?"

"Yeah," Sadie crosses her arms raising one thick eyebrow in almost a comical way, "They ask questions, I answer questions."

"I'm gay," Zayn blurts. He doesn't know why he tells her this he just does, because it only seems fair. He knows Sadie's sexuality.

"I know," she says a ghost of a smirk forming on her lips.

"Do they know?" 

"Louis does but that's because he has an acute gaydar I'm sure the other suspect," Sadie replies absentmindedly, "They wont mind."

Zayn shrugs and sits on the couch next to her and he's never good at asking questions so he does the only thing he can think of… he tells her his biggest secret, "I'm in love with Liam."

IT was weird admitting it to her, especially since she hasn't even admitted it to herself really. It's another thing he doesn't quite know what happened with. When his feelings for Liam turned to platonic to not platonic. When his gazes started to linger longer at his abs while they went to work out at the gym. When Liam's smile always made his own smile erupt. When touches and cuddles from Liam started to make his heart beat a beat faster.

"I know that too," she rolls her eyes.

"Do they know?"

"No," she laughs without humor, "I'm just perceptive unlike some people."

So Zayn talks to her, and he thinks she's okay. He doesn't know how okay turned to something else but it did and he's not really that sad about it. He's close with his other sisters, he supposes. But they're all a lot more younger or older than him by a significant amount of years and don't deal with powers on a daily basis or sexuality crisis's. Sadie's just different, maybe it's because he didn't grow up with her and he became more of a friend before became a brother.

***  
Sadie was just thinking she'd gotten over the brown haired girl that made her powers go wonky when suddenly every voice in Sadie's head goes deafening silent like someone put two pillows in her ears. 

Sadie feels completely fine, which was the weirdest part. She felt better than she has since she left the brown haired girl. It was like she was giving her back warmth and happiness and the bad mood she's been stuck in the past few hours dissipates.

"Hello again!" the girl smiles.

"H-hi," Sadie manages to murmur only glancing up to take a look at the brown haired girl. Her hair was tied in a braid to the side she had a laptop and textbook tucked under one arm and her wallet in the next, "What can I get you."

"Um…" her bright blue eyes flicker up for only a moment to look at the board, "What do you suggests I'm dreadful at making decisions."

"Lemon Zand Tea's usually good," Sadie finds herself saying. It was her favorite drink on the menu. The herbs they put in there were a natural relief for headaches, "Especially on a cold day."

She doesn't know why she's saying all of this. It's almost like there someone else crawling inside her body a chirpier happier version of Sadie that Sadie almost doesn't even like. 

"Fantastic, I'll have one of those and your phone number!"

"Erm…what?" Sadie feels an almost awkward feeling like someone was crawling in her bones. Every bone in her body was telling her not to grab her pen and pad of paper to her left, but for some reason her mind was betraying her and her hand was already reaching over.

"Oh crap," the girl blubbers her cheeks turning pink in an adorable manner, "I'm sorry I just assumed-you like literally seem like the typical Les-"

"I'm Bi," Sadie find herself laughing (laughing since when has she laughed when people called her the typical Lesbian?) Her mind wanders for a moment to how the girl was really cute when she was flustered her milky skin gained a deep red blush. Why was she laughing? Why was she finding this girl cute? Something was wrong? "I just…you seemed like the typical straight girl…"

"Oh…well I'm not. Don't quite enjoy dicks you see…"

"Well I get one free drink a day, and I wasn't planning on using it on myself."

She was actually, Sadie really was. She really really enjoys her Lemon Zand tea after listening to Steve's perverted thoughts about her ass.

"Oh," the girl says, "You don't have to do that-I don't even know your name."

"Sadie," Sadie responds with ease. God, this was borderline flirting and Sadie just doesn’t flirt. She usually the strong one in the relationship the one calling the orders. She doesn't deal with flirty bullshit. She remembers her and Victor how one moment they were taking shots in silence and the next she was making out with him.

"Oh…well. I'm Alexandera. But people just call me Alex."

"Alex," Sadie smiles (Sadie just doesn't smile…the occasional smirk maybe, but smiling just made her face feel funny), "Okay."

She makes her drink and scribbles her own number on the pad of paper before sliding it to Alex without really even thinking about it. Alex acts bashful and says a wide eyed thankful before walking out of the resteraunt.

Sadie stares at the door in awe and confusion forgetting she even lost her abilities until about five minutes later when it come rushing back at her all at once. All there voices screaming and she was having a hard time quieting to there normal low buzz. It hurt really bad, and it brings her back to when she first woke up at the hospital. The first voice she ever heard in her head was her nurse who was thinking just how to explain to Sadie that her dad died on impact.

She felt a dull ache too, the same ache she felt like last time Alex left. It was like Alex had taken a piece of her soul with her. She had the urge to run out of the coffee shop and find Alex as soon as possible and kiss her silly, but she also never wanted to see Alex again. This wasn't love, this wasn't a crush. As much as she doesn't like to admit it she knows what loves feels like. Love is the fondness she feels when Zayn decides to swing by the café after his art classes and drive Sadie home even though it only takes five minutes to walk. Love is what she (unfortunately) felt for Victor every time he'd give her a certain look. This as not anything she's ever felt before. She felt sick to be honest.

She's lucky she only has fifteen minutes of her shift left, because she couldn't leave early two days in a row.

She stumbles out of the café and home only to meet Zayn, who's sat on the counter to the kitchen waiting. Zayn who's sitting on the counter.

"Haven't seen you in awhile?" Zayn sounds almost bitter. Sadie bites her lip. She feels like something is missing. She was just so tired and emotionally drained.

She looks at Zayn for a few moments and opens her mouth but no words come out. His face changes from an almost glare to a softened look. Sadie doesn't like it. She almost misses the days when Zayn couldn't give a shit about Sadie. He grew this weird stupid protective streak somewhere around the time she and Victor broke up and it was almost annoying, "You alright."

The voices were just too loud she puts her hands to her ears she could hear the whole building now screaming and chaotic and she couldn't understand what anyone is saying.

A grip on her elbows brings her back to reality, "Sadie?"

Sadie takes a deep breath and slumps forward just pressing her face to Zayn's chest, "I met a girl." Sadie starts.

"Oh," Zayn grabs her shoulders and puts her at arm distance with a smile, "That's amazing Sadie."

"No," Sadie shakes her head and steps back so Zayn's hands hang mid air before moving around and hurrying off to her room. She wanted to tell Zayn everything, but she also had no idea what to really tell Zayn. Nothing was making sense anymore. It was like someone wiggled their way into her mind and dug and controlled and it was the worst feeling of her life, "It isn't."

***  
When Niall get's home from school Belise's sitting on the couch flipping through a magazine, "'M on my period, and I know you get squeamish around blood."

"Oh…erm yeah," Niall says. Ew. Ew. Ew, "Thanks for the warning."

She nods and he sits down on the couch next to her.

"We can still make out."

"'M not feeling it," she comments dryly, "There's this new Jennifer Lawrence movie coming out, you want to go?"

"I have another class in two hours, don't have enough time…" Belise says scooting closer and hooking his chin over her shoulder eyes grazing over the magazine. It was some weird girly magazine with nail polish tips. Looked kind of boring, but whatever, golf Magazines probably looked dreadfully boring to 

"I meant after school or this weekend or something," she says.

"Don't you usually do those types of things with Sadie?" Niall asks.

Belise stops reading and she looks straight ahead for a few moments and she gets an almost baffled expression on his face, "Forget I asked."

She than promptly stands up and starts to walk away her hair turning an angry red.

God girls could be so moody, must be her period. He doesn't know how Zayn dealed with living with four girls growing up. Belise and Sadie were enough.

"Bel!" Niall yells after her she ignores him and turns down the hall and Niall hears a angry slam that rattles the whole apartment and he's left sitting there wondering what the hell he did wrong. He was a little comfused.

"You’re a prick," someone says from the kitchen. Niall almost jumps out of his own skin as he turns around and looks at Zayn.

"What the hell Zayn, me and Belise were…" Niall stops himself really quickly.

"Shag like you've been doing for the past year during this hour?" Zayn questions, "No shit."

"How did you-"

"You’re a prick," Zayn repeats, he than says and gets this whole calculated look on his face leaning forward and resting his chin on his left hand which is smudged with caracole, "Does Belise look like the kind of girl who looks for the relationship you too have."

"What are you even talking about?" Niall admits he isn't the smartest gut in the world, but Zayn was making absolutely no sense. He was finished with the conversation, Zayn was being the prick. 

"Would you have stayed and watched?" Niall has to ask he just has too, "You know there's free porn sites for that."

Zayn rolls his eyes now looking through one of his science magazines, "I'm gay, Niall for one thing, and Belise knew I was in the room the whole time."

Niall doesn't know why exactly he's a prick, but sometimes he can sure act like an idiot.  
***  
Harry see's Louis through the window of the bakery and watches him walk in. He was the only one working right now. It'd been a slow afternoon, slower than usual. Harry's spent most of it baking some pastries he planned to bring home tonight for everyone.

"Harold," Louis greets with a smirk walking through the door.

"Lewis," Harry replies back a smile forming on his lips as he goes around the counter and embraces him like he hasn't seen him in a week, and maybe he did just see him this morning but the seven hours they've been apart has really felt like seven days (he tries to tell himself that he doesn't over exaggerate.)

Louis hugs Harry in a different way than Liam hugs Harry or his mum hugs Harry. He's a lot smaller than Harry for one thing, and if Harry hadn't known Louis personally, he'd look almost dainty. He has this way of tucking himself into Harry, his nose buried into Harry's neck his arms tight around Harry's waist. Harry can lean his head down and rest it on Louis's head and smell his ginger lemon shampoo, and Harry's own arms fit around Louis's shoulders boxing him in.

They just fit, like no one else Harry's ever met.

Louis doesn't talk for around ten minutes, not that Harry minds he just fills him in on the past seven hours with great detail and makes Louis an Apple Strudel.

When Louis does talk it's a lot softer and quieter than Harry's used too, "Last night."

"Yeah?" Harry stops needing the dough of the bread and gives Louis his full attention.

"Well…um you said you wanted to keep doing it…you were serious?"

"I suppose I was," Harry gives Louis a soft smile, "It’s a win win for me. I can make sure you don't get stabbed or beaten to death and I can make use of my powers."

Louis is grinning, "Fantastic, I'm glad because I already ordered your suit."

Harry looks up at him with a shocked expression yet excited expression, "Really?"

Louis eagerly nods grinning so his whole face crinkles up in a quite adorable way., "Well you can't be wearing hoodies and skinny jeans forever… can you?"

"Suppose not," Harry admits smiling so wide his cheeks start to hurt a little bit, this was all just so exciting, "You didn't have to do that, I could have figured it out."

"Really," Louis says, "Because you just happen to know someone who makes superhero costumes on a whim."

Harry chuckles, "Well…no not really, and how do you know one."

Louis half shrugs, "Um…she's a tailor really, and a make up artist too. Painted me a skeleton for my seventh Halloween. I've known her since I was a little kid, her and my mum grew up together. She doesn't usually makes hero costumes but she does on the side…or at least just for me."

"She's from your past?" Harry says in slight bewilderment, because Louis never talks about his past really. Harry knows he had five sisters a mum, and a stepdad whom he considered to be more of a real father than his own. But he didn't even know the sisters names or how they really died exactly, just that they were murdered and Louis somewhat blames himself for whatever reason. He never talked about any of his old friends or anyone he grew up with outside of his family.

Louis nods, "Erm, I said I'd drop by her apartment after your shift. She lives just a few blocks from here."

Harry has a dozen questions, but he keeps them to himself because it's surprising enough that Louis wants to share something about his past with him. Louis was honest enough about his past, but he never went into detail about how they died. Harry never pushed really, afraid Louis would close himself all the way.

After Marel comes and to take over the next shift of the Bakery, him and Louis head the few blocks to Louis's friends flat making small talk on the way.

Louis's friends lives in a decent apartment complex, not too fancy, but not as torn up and ruined as the flat the seven of them share. She lives on the second floor and Louis doesn't even knock on the door, he only pulls out a key explaining that Lou has a daughter and he doesn't want to risk waking the daughter from a nap. Because if that happens they'll be hell to pay.

Harry can't help but instantly perk up a the term daughter, because he's never had younger siblings, but he's always wanted about a gazillion. He loves children and took every opportunity he could to babysit back in Cheshire (until of course he became a human magnet). 

There's a young woman who appears to be in her thirties sitting on the couch sewing something and a small girl, no more than two playing with Barbie dolls on the floor.

"Uncle Louis!" the girl stands up squealing and running over to Louis on chubby toddler legs. She instant tugs at Louis's jeans and Louis grins before lifting her up and spinning her in a circle before placing her on his hip. 

Harry can't help but smile, because if they're anything better than children, it's Louis with children.

"Who dat?" she points at Harry and Harry gives a timid wave. She turns her head into Louis's neck shyly in response.

"That is my very very best friend Lux, Harry. Harry this is Lux."

Harry can't help but blush as the term very very best friend.

"Hi Lux!" Harry smiles.

Lux turns her head again whispering something into Louis's ear and Louis chuckles before saying, "She says you look like Prince Charming."

Harry laughs and the small woman stands up from the couch with a grin giving Louis a tight side hug and a kiss on his cheek leaving an imprint of bright pink lipstick that Louis didn't seem to mind he only smile and hugs her back with his free hand.

"You must be Harry," the woman smiles, "Louis talks all about you. I'm Lou."

Harry chuckles and gives Louis a side-glance, "Wish I can say the same about you."

Lou tuts in response and lets go of Louis looking Harry up and down, "Well Louis wasn't exaggerating, you are a giant."

Harry blushes, Louis snorts.

"Hmmm," she says continues to look at Harry for a few moments before speaking again walking to the couch in elegant strides to fetch the silver and black spandex suit laid on the couch armrest., "The suit should just barely fit, but your still young and growing and muscle mass can always change. This will have to do for now."

The material is soft in his hands, and Harry can't quite determine what it is. It's defiantly not spandex like Harry was expecting, but it was obviously a stretchy material that seemed to be equally thick and strong.

Harry goes into the bathroom to change, and surprisingly it isn't that hard to get on and once it is on it hugs to every curve and rippling muscle. IT felt surprisingly light and airy like he was almost naked (which Harry greatly appreciated because why can't everyone just walk around in the nude). 

The shoes were silver boots with a slight heel, a lot like the leather brown boots he was prone to wearing (Harry wonders if Louis especially requested that because Louis has a total different pair of shoes). They're a little more comfortable than his brown boots cushioned and a little less of a heel, also much lighter.

When he comes out Lou and Louis analyze him and Lux runs up and grabs on Harry's hand, "Your going to be my prince," she declares.

"Okay," Harry agrees with a chuckle. His hand feels rather large in her small dainty one.

"Perfect," Lou claps her hands, "Louis requested the boots, and I was a little wary on them but you seem to pull them off marvelously."

She grabs a black object from the couch and steps forward going on her tippy toes and placing it on his eyes, "It's naturally sticky, a little uncomfortable but it get's the job done. If there's too much residue just was it under the tap and lightly message the material."

Harry nods sort of absentmindedly and Louis grabs Harry's arm and pulls him into a full length mirror putting a hand on the small of his back Louis grins, "There, now you’re a proper superhero."

Harry can't help but agree.

***  
Sadie had once again locked the door and Belise could hear the faint knocking of Zayn and soft pleads that were lessoning by the minutes. As angry as Belise was at her, she was a little worried. Only a little bit. Niall had slinked back into his room (or closet) the moment he got home from his afternoon classes catching Belise's glance as a good warning.

Louis and Harry came home not long after that both grinning and talking up a storm until they saw Belise on the couch. They both stopped talking instantly and gave each other wary looks before Harry declared he was going to start dinner and Louis sat on the couch.

Belise pokes into Louis's side once Harry leaves the room, "What was that about?" she questions ,"Are you and Harry a thing…."

Louis goes wide eyes and bubblers, "Erm…no of course not…why? No…we're not."

Belise chuckles, "I'm only kidding," she than frowns, "Partially. You have been kind of in your own world since we've started living together.."

Louis recovers and sulks for a few moments before his left brow raises up (which only means trouble) ,"Where's your boy toy?"

"My boy toy," Belise responds incredulously.

"Niall," Louis assures.

Belise scoffs, "He's not-"

"Your part time shag, friend with benefit? Don't lie to me Belise, I've walked in on you two…"

It's Belise's turn to get flustered as she sits straight up, "You have-how far-"

"Hush hush small one," (Louis was two inches shorter so she had no idea who he was calling 'small one') "Niall only had his shirt off, but it was pretty clear how far it was going so I left the room."

Belise huffs and sinks into the cushions of the couch. Louis pokes her in the cheek, "So I take it your in a huffy puff…"

"Huffy puff?"

"An argument!" Louis exclaims, "Do I have to explain everything to you?"

Belise rolls her eyes, "Yes and no."

Louis frowns, "Did he take things too far do I have to…"

"No…no it's just," Belise sighs because this was something she would usually tell Sadie, (she could occasionally give good advice despite her reputation of having crappy relationships) but considering Sadie's kind of being weird right now and very bitchy about the whole Niall thing she might as well confide in Louis right. He might be dramatic but she knows she wouldn't blabber about her and Niall's relationship to the whole house. Just Harry, "I…I have feelings for him, and I'm like ninety percent sure he does too."

"Well then tell him about it!" Louis nudges her.

"I've tried but he's daft," Belise whines putting her face on his shoulder, "His brain cells are like gone."

"Can't argue with that," Louis says patting her shoulder in the most non comforting manner, "How about you make him jealous or something. Make him admit his feelings to you. Your not daft, you'll take hints."

"But that's sort of manipulative?"

Louis shrugs, "It'll get the job done."

Belise sighs and just shakes her head into Louis's shoulder, he pats her head like she's a dog in response. She was feeling like she was in high school again because fro Christ sake, this felt like such a high school problem.  
***  
Liam was only an EMT in training, so most of the time he just observed and offered assistance to his trainers. But there were times when things were so crazy and there were so many lives on the line that he had to be heads on and he had to be alone.

It was a severe auto wreck, there were two other Ambulances there besides his own and he was still alone. He was immediately told to go to a girl who was pinned in the car and stay with her. 

He finds out later that she isn't a priority even though she's bleeding out because she'll most likely die no matter what because there's just not enough man power and equipment to get her out of the car.

So he stays with her and holds her hand. She's crying and telling Liam stuff that he listens too. He tells her about her two kids and her husband. She tells him her youngest is sick with the flu and she was just going out to get cough medicine. He brushes her hair out of her face and using his powers he discreetly summons enough water around him to gently wash the blood off her face. If she notices his powers she doesn't say, she just continues to talk about her kids like she wasn't just bleeding out.

And then she coughs and her eyes closed and he remembers screaming for help.

She wasn't a priority they tell him as they finally get to the hospital because he's angry because he could have been better he could have just done something to save her. They tell him to leave before his shift ends because he'll do no good in the state he's in and one of his co workers, Jeff he thinks, (he felt too dazed to remember) drove him home because apparently it wasn't going to be safe if he went on the bus alone. Jeff even walks him up the seven flights of stairs and to his door.

Liam opens it up and hardly notices Jeff trailing behind him.

HE looks around the living room at his six roommates (in the back of his mind he's thankful Niall isn't summoning fire or Harry isn't making a tin can float cross the room because Jeff was right behind him).

There all there (including Sadie who he hasn't seen in two days and is sitting on the couch sort of scowling) she's the first to look over and it only takes her a second to gasps. Fucking mind reader.

Zayn looks over next and it only takes one look for him to be standing up and walking over to Liam in fast strides catching him as Liam's knee's buckle and gently lowering them both to the floor. Liam just curls into Zayn (even though Liam's much bigger) and Zayn just wraps his arms around Liam hugging him close and rocking him slightly.

He hears Jeff give a vague evaluation of the crash and hears his roommates quiet responses, but he concentrates more on putting his had to Zayn's chest and listening to Zayn's heartbeat through his shirt. He hears Zayn softly murmuring to him telling him it's 'okay' and that he 'did all he could' but Liam just cries harder because those are lies. Liam could have done something.

The rest of the evening sort of blurs on, he gets from the floor to the couch where Zayn is trying to coax Liam into eating cold Lasagna Harry must have made a few hours earlier. But every times he even feels a little bit hungry his appetite is ruined by the sight of blood and a stone cold face. Zayn eventually gives up ushering him into their room and into the same bed. Liam clutches onto Zayn tightly putting his head to Zayn's chest as Zayn murmurs more comforting words rubbing his hand against Liam's back.

Liam eventually blubbers out the evenings events in his perspective, because he has too, he as to get it out. When he's done his eyes are drooping an he's so close to drifting asleep but Zayn's voice stops him.

"There was nothing you could have done Liam," Zayn says his voice hard and determined, "Nothing, you hear. This isn't on you. Okay."

"Okay," Liam mumbles, but he doesn't believe it. He only starts thinking of ways he could do better, not just for the poor lady who died tonight, but to everyone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you like it? ummmm.... tell me what you think possibly? I just want to know if people hate this or not.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Liam tries to figure out how to actually help people. Belise breaks things off with Niall and tries to talk to Sadie. Louis is trying to help Liam. Harry is cuddling everyone. Sadie starts having blackouts. Niall's heartbroken. Zayn's about ready to pull his hair out.

Louis can hear Liam's cries through the door, he can hear Zayn's soft reassures. A light is suddenly flickered on cascading through the cracks and into the hallway where Louis stands feeling completely helpless. Liam was one of his best friends (although he wasn't at first) he'd always been so strong and fearless. He'd just recently started to go into the field of being an EMT, and there was a silent worry through everyone of how he would react to the death part of the job. This was a worse case scenario. 

"You shouldn't be listening to that," Harry grabs his wrist and lightly tugs him to the kitchen.

Louis sighs because Harry was right, it was sort of an invasion of privacy.

"'M just worried you know, he's been waking up screaming for three nights…" Louis looks down at his feet. He hadn't meant to listen but when he heard Liam's first wail for some reason his feet stayed right planted where they were outside of his friends bedroom.

"It was the first time someone's died in front of him on the job," Harry says grimly, "You know the saying. The first is always the hardest."

"I know that," Louis says a little more harsh than he meant and Harry frowns his grip tightening on Louis's wrist to a dull pressure.

"No one's ever…"

Louis frowns and slides his wrist out of Harry's grip to grasp it in his own, "We can't save everyone Harry."

"Who was your first?" Harry mumbles then his eyes widen, realizing he already knew the answer to his own question, "Fuck sorry, that was insensitive."

"My first were my parents," Louis says softly, "You know that already."

"Forgot," Harry mumbles looking down sheepishly.

"Hey," Louis says gripping Harry's hand more tight, "I'm not mad about you asking questions, can't promise I can answer them all but I'm not mad."

Harry nods and lets go of Louis's hand and turns enveloping him in one of his full bodied hugs that makes Louis feel small but his heart incredibly large, "I'm sorry about your parents."

Louis finds it funny that people still apologize over something that's happened three years ago, and most defiantly isn't there fault (it's Louis's if it's anyone's). He was sort of exhausted of the pity though, although he'd never say it out loud because he knows people are just trying to be nice.

"It was three years ago," Louis says. It's what Louis always says, it's easier then denying there pity all together.

"That doesn't mean it can't hurt any less," Harry squeezes him tighter. 

Louis sort of melts into his embrace, "I'm really worried about Liam, he's showing serious signs of PTSD."

If Harry was wondering how Louis knows the signs of PTSD he doesn't say anything, Harry may have even already been aware. He knows full well about Louis's own nightmares.

"I am too," Harry agrees, "But Zayn and him are doing their thing right now, he'll be back to his own self in no time."

***  
Zayn wakes up with a wet spot on his chest and arms to tight around his waist. He open's his eyes to find a face full of Liam's hair. 

He was asleep at least, Zayn thinks, glancing at the clock. It was nine o'clock on a Saturday meaning Zayn didn't have school and Liam didn't have training (Zayn would have called him in sick for his third day in a row anyways). He lost count of how many times Liam had awoken this night. Seven? Eight times? 

Not that he minded being woken by Liam exactly, he'd rather be there for Liam that for him to deal with the nightmares alone. He's just a little sad that he's having them in the first place. IT's just not fair, Zayn thinks. Liam was too good for the world.

He was worried, though. Liam's been waking up with nightmares way too much to be healthy.

He runs his fingers through Liam's hair for a moment's and listens to his soft evening snores. Liam's nose suddenly crinkles and his eyes blearily open.

"Hi," he mumbles.

"Hey babe," Zayn gives him what he hopes is a reassuring smile.

Liam gives him a timid smile that doesn't meet his eyes and then frown, "Thought I would be over it by now, sorry."

"Don't be sorry," Zayn hums.

Liam just shakes his head. Zayn just wished Liam realized how amazing he was. How the woman dying wasn't his fault. How he didn't have to be sorry for being effected by his death. It was traumatizing for him.

"Are you hungry?" Zayn asks scratching at Liam's scalp.

Liam nods and starts to climb out of bed Zayn follows behind him putting an arm around Liam's bare waist. Liam leans close and if it was different circumstances of why Liam was so miserable he'd be feeling his heart swell and the beat of it speed up. But instead he felt the lingering sense of helplessness because Liam was truly and utterly distraught over this whole situation and Zayn had truly no idea how to help him.

 

***

Sadie get's the call on a Saturday at twelve from Alex asking if they could meet for lunch. Sadie doesn't want to really. She was finally feeling better and not feeling the results from being around Alex anymore. She was finally leaving her room and socializing a little bit. But she needed answers. What the hell did Alex even do to her?

Now that she had warning at least, maybe she could try to fight it. To try to ask Alex what she was doing to Sadie's mind and tell her to stop and to never come close to Sadie again. She just needed closure. Alex could always come to her work if Sadie never replied, it's not like she didn't know when her shift was.

So she grabs a hoodie gives Zayn and Liam whom are the only ones home besides Sadie herself a half assed excuse on getting Nandos and leaves the house.

Alex comes ten minutes late and the moment she gets into Sadie's line of sight Sadie feels it. She tries to fight it this time. And somewhat succeeds, feeling dazed but aware enough that she wasn't completely awe struck by Alex like she was the two times before. 

She still but a muffler on Sadie's other powers, but at least it wasn't like Alex was controlling her every action.

"Who are you?" Sadie asks.

"I already told you silly! Alex!" Alex says. Sadie thinks her voice is too cheery and sweet. So deceiving. It was like looking at Alex in a whole different light.

"I mean what did you do to me-what are you trying to do to me?"

"I just want you to love me," Alex smiles sweetly and suddenly the fight Sadie was putting up was lost and she looses all awareness until everything fades into black.

 

When Sadie becomes aware again she's laying on cement in an alley her head is killing her and she feels sick enough to throw up. She stands up using the building wall next to her as support as she made her way to the sidewalk a few feet away.

While staggering there she tries to remember what happened. She doesn't even remember leaving the house. Her last memory was telling Zayn and Liam she was going to Nandos, which is quite ironic, because she doesn't even like Nandos.

The street she was on was ten blocks from.

She has her phone out and she's dialing Zayn's number in an instant, and only when he picks up she starts to regret it because Zayn's going to have questions that she wont have the answer to.

"I need you to pick me up," Sadie's voice was croaky and dry as if she'd been screaming.

"Nandos is only a block away are you really-"

She tells him she's not at Nandos and then tells him the street he pauses for a second before murmuring something about grabbing his keys and hanging up. She sinks to the ground and buries her head into her knee's curling into a bawl and trying to just remember. It doesn't work and she feels frustrated tears building in her eyes.

She hears Zayn's beat up truck pulling to the side of the road and she looks up from her knee's and she fights off tears. Liam's waiting in the passenger seat and Sadie wished she had the audacity to be annoyed at Zayn for bringing the other boy along, but Liam's been a right mess the past few days and she doesn't blame Zayn for not trusting him home alone.

"Sadie?" Zayn crouches in front of her and she feels like a little kid.

"I'm fine," Sadie replies on instinct, "Er…can you help me up."

Zayn frowns and grabs her elbow hauling her to her feet. Her legs were wobbly and it didn't feel like she had nee caps anymore.

"What's wrong with you?" Zayn looks her over and Sadie doesn't reply.

"I'm fine," is all she tells him.

"Your obviously not," Zayn says, "What the hell is going on?"

"I'm fine," she repeats. 

Liam grabs her hand once she gets into the truck and pulls her into the middles seat as Zayn hops in the passenger seat. Liam pats her nee in what Sadie supposes was suppose to be a comforting manner and Liam gives her a wry smile.

"Why won't you tell me?" Zayn eventually says once he's started the car and drove down the street, "I'm your brother you should trust me."

"I do trust you," Sadie says and she wants to add, 'I just think I may be going insane', but she doesn't she just stares forward.

"I'm worried about you," Zayn says, "I care about you."

Sadie wants to scream at him now. He was making her feel guilty. She shakes her head and just rests her elbows on her knees and buries her face her palms pressing heavily on her eye sockets.

The cars silent for a moment.

"Please," Zayn adds, "I want to help you… Is it drugs?"

"It isn't fucking drugs," Sadie says, "At least I don't think it's drugs-I don't know."

"How do you not know if your on drugs or not?" Liam asks softly.

"I…I like blacked out," Sadie relents, "I remember leaving the house I just don't remember why except for the fact that I lied to you about going to Nandos. I woke up in the alley…"

"That doesn't explain what's been going on the fast few days… you sort of locked yourself in your room and went out of your way to avoid everyone," Zayn says.

"I met a girl," Sadie sighs, "And she like messed with my powers and it freaked me out."

"It was nothing big," Sadie says frustrated tears prickling her eyes again and she could feel a hand rest on her shoulder. She didn't know which one of them it was but she didn't shrug off the hand like she usually would when someone went to comfort her. Her brain felt jumbled and she realizes something else again, that she's not hearing any voices again. It only takes her a moment to register the emptiness before their back all at once screaming and loud. Her stomach lurches.

"Pull over," she mumbles sitting up. 

Zayn's eyes widen and he tugs the car to the side of the road where he slides out. She makes it too the ground before she's doubling over and throwing up.

***  
"I can't erm like sleep with you anymore…" Belise says.

Niall almost spits out his burger the moment the words leave her mouth.

Fuck…fuck…fuck… He should have seen this coming the moment she bribed him outside with the promise of food. She didn't want to sleep with him anymore? What was he going to do…he'd have to find another girlfriend (because he didn't know anyone else besides Belise that he trusted with the whole friends with benefits thing). He tries to swallow but only ends up practically choking. Belise moves around to the other side of the table and starts to pat his back with a somewhat incredulous look on his face. A chunk of her hair colored pink escapes from her beanie and Niall brings his hand to her face to tuck it back under once he can breathe again.

"Why?" he croaks throat feeling raw. His heart felt like it was exploding out of his chest.

"I meat a guy in my Greek and Roman Studies class," she says softly, "He's amazing Niall."

"That's great," Niall forces a smile on his face and pats his shoulder. She smiles a little bit but the strand of hair he just tucked back in falls out again and its blue which is weird (she should be happy, she found someone besides Niall, she should be happy). Not sad, "I'm happy for you."

"I don't want this to be weird," Belise says, "Your one of my best friends Niall."

Niall feels his heart swell and clench at the words.

"Yeah," he says, "Your mine too."

"I have a date tomorrow, going to see the new Jenifer Lawrence movie," she beams.

Wait no! She offered him to go to that movie! Was Niall really this replaceable… Stop Niall, you weren’t even in an actual relationship.

"I'm really happy for you," Niall says.

When Niall get's back to the flat he forces a smile and retreats back to his closet room to cry. Fuck…fuck….he needed Belise! He was loosing Belise.

"Niall? Dinner's ready?" Harry asks.

"Is Belise back yet?" Niall croaks out.

"No, she went shopping or something for her date tomorrow…" Harry says.

"'M not hungry," Niall burrows deeper into his covers even though he was already hot and it was getting sort of musky in the room from all the perspiration.

Harry opens the closet door without invitation and squints down, "You alright buddy?"

"Fine," Niall says miserably.

Harry leaves but doesn't close the door behind him, Nialls too mentally done to do anything about it, at least Harry was leaving him alone. 

He was wrong about the Harry leaving him alone, because he comes back a few minutes later with two plates of food and crawls up next to Niall onto the matrass and gives him the plate. Harry was being nice, Niall supposed, so he guess he should eat. 

They eat in silence, and once there done Harry once again leaves, Niall thinks he's down with him until he comes back and sits next to Niall. They sit there for a few moments until Harry wraps his long limbs around him pulling him into a full bodied cuddle.

Niall starts crying again because he only really wants cuddles from Belise. 

"It's okay," Harry mumbles into Niall's neck even though he has no real clue what's going on, "Your fine."

He wasn't fine and he never was going to be fine but he needed to explain to Harry why that is so, so he tells him about Belise and his friends with benefits things and Belise calling it off.

"Dunno why I'm so emotional about it," Niall sputters out, "People aren't suppose to get emotional over friends with benefits."

"They do when there in love," Harry says softly rubbings his hand through Niall's hair.

"'M not in love with her," Niall buries his head into Harry's shoulder and he knows Harry doesn't believe him so he finds it necessary to repeat himself, "I'm not!"

"Okay…okay…" Harry mumbles. Niall knows he still doesn't believe him, but Niall's not even sure if he believes himself so instead he just buries his face deeper into Harry's shoulder.

***  
Harry comes home from his shift to find Liam on the couch absentmindedly watching TV but concentrating on it with blank eyes. He's surprised to find Zayn not glued to his side, like he's been the past few days.

Harry sits down next to him and places a soft hand on his elbow which jolts him out of whatever daze he was in and he flips his head to stare at Harry with wide eyes, "Sorry…sorry…" Harry mumbles, "Erm where's everyone else."

"Belise dragged Niall to some movie," Liam says, "Dunno where Louis is, and erm Sadie's having a proper crisis."

"Crisis? Like boy trouble again…or girl…"

"Sort of I suppose," Liam frowns scratching the back of his neck like he always does when he's uncomfortable, "It was a big enough crisis for Zayn to force me to bring her to the hospital and get her tested to see if she was high…" he frowns, "She wasn't but she's like sick now so he's taking care of her."

"Oh," Harry's eyes furrow because that's just odd, "Okay…you doing okay Liam."

Liam nods and Harry can tell, that no…he wasn't really doing okay. So he puts his arm around him and let's Liam burrow into his side.

"I still can see her face…and I still am having dreams about it except it's like my family now in the crash or like you guys and it's horrible…"

"'M sorry," Harry runs his hands through Liam's hair because he knows that comforts him. It's weirder to do it now that it was shorter but Liam seemed to visibly relax at the action, "Your too good for the world Payno…you realize that?"

Liam's shoulder moves in what could be considered a shrug but Harry knows Liam doesn't actually believe that.

"I know you've started going out with Louis," Liam states out of the blue.

Harry stiffens and Liam places a hand on his chest in what Harry assumes is suppose to be calming, "I'm not going to scold you."

Well that's considerably surprising, Liam was always scolding someone about something. Harry's fallen victim to it several times.

"How'd you figure it out…" Harry asks eventually.

"Well I'm the only one in the flat who actually does their laundry and I found a second suit that's way too big to be Louis's…"

Harry lets a chuckle go out of his mouth.

"I want in," Liam adds suddenly.

"What?" Harry stiffens again and he feel's Liam's fingers curl into Harry's shirt.

"I need to make it up…I need-" Liam sounds absolutely panicked suddenly, and fuck it scares the crap out of Harry.

"Whoa…whoa you don't need to make up anything," Harry says, "If you think that, that lady's death was your fault your wrong. You did what you could. You held her hand."

"I just…I want too…" Harry could practically hear Liam tell him, that holding her hand wasn't enough, but he doesn't instead he adds ,"IT helped Louis right? Get over the death of his family?"

"It…I don't know," Harry murmurs, because he honestly doesn't know if Louis is over their death. He still get's this faraway look all the time., "It helps him live on I guess…it didn't help him get over it he's not over it."

"He has PTSD you know that Harry?"

Harry nods because he might not like to remember that strong Louis has weaknesses, but he's aware he does.

"Yeah…" Harry swallows, "I know."

"I just want to…." Liam frowns, "I've always wanted to help people…and I can only do so much as an EMT….I just maybe want to help them before they get hurt. Does that make any sense?"

"Yeah," Harry frowns, "Yeah that makes perfect sense."

***

Belise feels somewhat miserable trudging back to the house nothing in hand even though she claimed going grocery shopping. She brushes Louis off when he asks her if she's alright and carefully goes to retreat to her room. She doesn't expect the door to swing open the moment she reaches for the door handle and she's faced with a peeved looking Zayn.

He carefully closes the door behind him.

"Something's wrong with her," Zayn says.

Yeah, she's come down with a case of Bitchyness. Belise doesn't voice that opinion instead she only nods crossing her arms and looking down the hall at Niall's closet room his door is closed (and it usually wasn't) unless he was changing. Even when he was asleep he kept it open claiming it got too stuffy and he was afraid he'd run out of oxygen and suffocate one day. 

"She's had a supposed blackout and has been throwing up for the past hour," Zayn's words turn her head curiously.

"What? What's wrong with her? Is it the flu?"

Zayn frowns and shakes his head, "No," he says, "At least I don't think so. She wont tell me anything. She just left for Nandos and called me an hour and a half later saying she needed a ride back and telling me what street she was on. When me and Liam picked her up she could barely stand and she looked on the verge of tears."

Tears…Sadie on the verge to tears Belise almost wanted to roll her eyes and walk away because Sadie doesn't just cry. Sadie wasn't an emotional person really. She didn't cry, she didn't yell but she didn't smile or laugh either. It's never discussed out loud and no on really asks her about it, but they all suspect it's because her powers (while powerful in a different way than anyone else in the group) still have a lot to do with emotions. And she isn't like Niall who's skin starts to burn to the touch, or like herself who's hair changes color. She just hears more and Belise likes to assume it must be sort of exhausting hearing everyone's thoughts, quite loud too. She doesn't get how Sadie manages sometimes.

"You think it has to do with her powers?"

"Fuck…I don't know…" Zayn runs his hand through his hair and Belise determines he's more worried than actually annoyed. She finds it sweet almost because Belise's always been an only child and she's never had the chance to form a sibling bond, "I'm worried…can you try to talk to her…"

"I'll try," Belise assures, "But last time we talked I called her an…well… it was really mean…" She wasn't in the mood to get chewed out by Zayn for telling Sadie that half her family hated her (even though it was true it was horrible and Daisy never truly understood why they hated Sadie) so just sighs, "I was horrid."

"I'm sure it wasn't that bad," Zayn mumbles, "She's been a little horrid these past few days too eh?"

Belise nods, "I'll try."

"Thank you…no pressure either…yeah?"

Belise nods and bitterly thinks that, that does nothing to relieve any of the pressure.

Sadie is rolled over so her front is facing the wall when Belise comes in. There's a garbage can besides her bed that has a little bit of bile in it that smells absolutely disgusting but she ignores it and goes to sit at the foot of Sadie's bed.

"You shouldn't have a conversation on the other side door about a mind reader," is the first thing Sadie says her voice even but it was scratchy and raw and Belise wonders how much Sadie threw up.

"Not out smartest idea," Belise sits on the edge of her bed.

"I'm sorry about saying that stuff about you and Niall," she says surprising Daisy quite a bit (Sadie hardly ever apologized) ,"It's none of my business…"

"Well it's over now sort of," Belise says, "I hope it isn't. I ended the friends in benefit thing and I'm going to start dating someone from Uni. I like the guy from Uni well enough, who knows I might-"

"Make Niall jealous?" Sadie says.

Belise furrows her eyebrows and out of the corner of her eye see's her hair go pink, "I was going to say get a really good relationship."

Derek seemed like a really nice guy. She just couldn't do whatever she had with Niall. She was just hurting her self. If Niall did have feelings he wasn't acting on them, which meant he wasn't ready for a relationship. She couldn't just force one on him. She's tried asking him out on a date even, but Niall just got confused. She has to move on and even if Derek might not be the next big relationship he'd be a good rebound at least.

Sadie stays silent ,"Okay good luck."

"What has gotten in to you," Belise inquires, "Your being polite."

"I feel bad Belise, don't get use to it." Sadie actually sounded sincere…or as sincere as Sadie can sound.

Daisy's quite for a moment, "So will you tell me what's going on?"

Sadie rolls over, "I'm ninety percent sure I'm loosing my mind, that's what's going on."

Daisy frowns and leans forward to brush Sadie's sweaty hair off her forehead. She doesn't flinch like she usually does when someone tries to touch her, only lets it happen. Sadie was quite pretty actually (Daisy sometimes forgot because she was always scowling). Dirty blond hair. Thick eyebrows. Tan skin. Blue eyes. She looked so miserable though, and Daisy had no doubt in her mind that Sadie was thoroughly convinced she was loosing her mind.

"Care to elaborate," Daisy asks.

Sadie closes her eyes for a brief moment and exhales, but doesn't reply. 

That's a no, and Daisy sighs, but isn't too shocked. Because if Zayn, the only person Daisy is sure Sadie really trusts in the world, isn't getting answers out of her….Sadie's likely to remain a closed book for awhile.

Daisy sighs, "I'll leave you alone then."

***  
"I don't know Liam," Louis sighs, "Zayn'll kill me if-"

"He knows," Liam says. It's midnight, the flat had quieted to an almost silence. The ones awake trying to stay at a quiet murmur. The ones asleep dead to the world.

"What?" Louis hisses, "Didn't he go ape shit? Why hasn't the overprotective bastard attacked me yet?"

"Because the overprotective bastard," Zayn grumbles slipping out of the hallway and into the living room perching on the armrest of the chair Liam was sitting in "Wants to help Liam and he can only do so much to help Liam…"

"I don't need help," Liam says (as much as he loves cuddles and attention from Zayn he was tired of the pitying looks he was giving him) ,"I just need to do something. I need to actually help someone. You have to understand-"

"I understand plenty," Louis frowns, "I just want you to be sure… it's a lot different from what you'd think. It's different than your superhero movies Liam-this is real…and it isn't pretty at all. A dead body doesn't stand up and walk around once the-"

"I'm perfectly aware about dead bodies thankful…"

Louis winces, "Sorry…sorry I just…Liam your so…"

"He just doesn't want you to get hurt," Zayn rests a hand softly on Liam's shoulder, "Louis is trying to tell you he cares very deeply about you."

"I was not," Louis tries to defend (Liam has known Louis long enough to know he's meaning the exact opposite).

"I need to do this- or I need to try…"

"Okay," Louis says, "I'm not sure how this would work though…it'll be a little much being in a group of three-"

"Four," Zayn corrects.

"Wait," Louis says, "Your coming…?"

"Yes," Zayn reaches forward to zap Louis in the side enough to make him sit fully up and for his feathery hair to spike a little bit, "I'm not totally useless."

Louis wines a bit rubbing his side looking annoyed (and maybe a little admiring) , "Jeez…that's not what I meant I just…you’re the type to help people by like curing cancer not fighting crime…."

Zayn reaches his hand to zap him again and Louis puts his hands up in surrender, "That doesn't mean you'll be bad…it's just surprising is all."

Zayn sort of pouts and Liam can't help but find it cute. Fuck, Liam thinks, you need to stop.

"I still think four's going to be a bit much all together….me and Haz have been fine as two-"

"Than I'll take Liam and you can take Zayn," Harry appears at the doorway (or maybe he's been standing there observing the whole time Liam can't be too sure), "I've been doing this for a few nights now I think I got a hang of things. Don't show our face, don't talk to much."

Louis frowns, "Your still knew at this…I'm not sure…"

"Liam and me will have your backs and I trust you and Zayn will have each other's back's too?"

Louis studies Harry for a second and Harry studies him right back. It's almost like they were having some sort of mental conversation and Liam would find it creepy if they didn't do it all the time and wasn't completely used to it.

"I suppose that'll do," Louis says.

And the four of them leave into the darkness of the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> eh could have gone better.... Comment?

**Author's Note:**

> So erm.... comments?


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